The words “problem,” “solving,” and “GIS” are often used together. GIS is regularly touted as a technology that helps people solve problems. If the problem is that a wilderness search and rescue team needs help identifying a location suitable to land a helicopter, GIS can help with that. If you are a political campaign manager and you want to understand the socio-economic demographic patterns of the people who have been donating to your campaign, GIS has your back. Do you have multiple years’ worth of classified land use, land cover data covering the same geographic area and you need to quantify and qualify the changes? Hit the GIS Easy button.

In reality, however, reaching solutions happens that directly and easily only in the marketing brochures. The actual real-world process will be characterized by stumbles, a hassle or two, and a few work-arounds. Regular practitioners know the tremendous amount of work that a GIS project can represent in terms of question clarification and refinement, data collection and management, and software skill acquisition and application, among countless other tasks.